


What's Got Ahold Of Me

by roymustang (SpicyReyes)



Category: Fullmetal Alchemist - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Arranged Marriage, Alternate Universe - Royalty, Arranged Marriage, M/M, Politics, Prince Ed
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-18
Updated: 2018-08-18
Packaged: 2019-06-29 04:25:47
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,181
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15721932
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SpicyReyes/pseuds/roymustang
Summary: Prince Edward Elric of Xerxes has very thin patience for politics, which makes him the worst possible candidate for a marriage-centric alliance agreement.Unfortunately, no one actually asked.





	What's Got Ahold Of Me

**Author's Note:**

> im writing too many fics at once and i dont even have any excuse tbqh  
> here is some edling just because i couldnt believe this fic didnt exist yet
> 
> title is from the song 'did i say that out loud' by the barenaked ladies because thats edling as fuck

Edward spun one end of the pen in his fingers, squinting at the delicate decoration along the metal nib on the other as he did so. It seemed unnecessary, putting fine little lines in a part of a tool that few people would ever bother to inspect. He wondered how long the maker had studied engraving to be able to etch such tiny, neat curves into a mere millimeter of iridium-coated gold. 

A soft  _ click  _ announced his victory, and he breathed out his quietest possible  _ “Aha!”  _ Carefully, he turned the pen over, setting the loosened tip aside to inspect the inner workings. As he picked apart the mechanisms, his finger slipped, knocking the converter and the feed apart, breaking the connection through which the ink flowed. Black liquid started seeping out the tiny crack that formed, painting Ed’s fingers.

“Shit!” he whispered to himself. “Shit, shit, shit…”

“Edward?”

Ed straightened, lowering his hands slightly, mind turning wildly to try and think of a way to either hide or explain the pen he’d just massacred.

Across the table, his father and mother watched him - the former looking annoyed; the latter, amused - and said nothing, simply letting the judgmental stares of the councilmen speak for themselves. 

“…Sorry, were you talking to me?” Ed finally gave in and asked.

He heard his brother let out a sigh beside him, and gave a sheepish smile to the increasingly angry faces around him. 

“Are pens your latest project?” his mother, ever the saint, asked him. “You seem to be studying that one rather intently.” 

“I had a few ideas,” Ed said, even though he really hadn’t. Most of his fiddling was him trying to occupy himself, because the council had been debating foreign policy with his father for  _ hours,  _ and he was  _ bored.  _

Xerxes was a wealthy country, prosperous due to their unrivaled academia and their unique mastery over the forces of the natural world through alchemy. As a general rule, they didn’t make much contact with other countries. International trade was strong, and the source of most of their income, but they didn’t really buy anything from outside their own walls and they most certainly didn’t entertain the idea of international  _ travel.  _  Their nation was a secretive, shifty one, and most of the people even within the country itself had never seen the king.

Edward was the eldest son of the king, the crown prince, and his expert opinion was that it was a whole bunch of  _ bullshit _ . The council members were experts in their fields selected to advise his father in one meeting and one  _ only,  _ never repeating visits. No one outside the royal family could reliably describe what King Hohenheim even looked like. Edward interacted with next to no one, outside the royal physicians and their family. His only friend his age was his damn  _ automail mechanic.  _ Worse still, he couldn’t further any of his studies beyond what the books in the palace library could teach him, because he wasn’t able to get a  _ tutor,  _ let alone an apprenticeship. 

_ Why would you need to be an apprentice?  _ people asked him, when he mentioned it.  _ Aren’t you going to be king?  _

He’d rather fucking  _ not,  _ actually, but that was beside the point. 

The  _ point  _ was that a foreign policy meeting was a waste of everyone’s time, because they were inevitably going to decide to do the same amount of  _ nothing _ they always did, and Ed’s time will be officially wasted. 

“While you were distracted,” Hohenheim said, making Ed grit his teeth at the slightly condescending edge the words had to his ears. “We were discussing solutions to our current tensions with Xing.”

Ed blinked, and then looked to Al, because he was pretty sure asking ‘we have tensions with Xing?’ would just get him into even deeper trouble. 

It wasn’t his fault that Al paid more attention to these things than he did. Or, well, it  _ was,  _ but he wasn’t about to change that. 

“The emperor of Xing is pressing us to share information on alchemy,” Al told him. “He’s asking us to prove that the Ishvalans are wrong, and that we’re not sitting on a secret weapon of mass destruction.”

“Tell him to shove it,” Ed said, looking back to Hohenheim, and pretended he didn’t see all the exasperated eye rolls of the councilors. “What’s he want us to do? Personally teach him alchemy?”

“A gesture of good faith is what we need,” Hohenheim said. “We were trying to find a way to show that we have no intentions of starting a war with any of our neighbors, least of all Xing.”

“Marry Al off to a princess,” Ed joked. 

“A political marriage was considered,” Hohenheim said, entirely serious. “But the heir of Xing is undecided, and so we could not determine who would have the power to make the move.”

“Wait, you’re serious?” Ed straightened in his seat, hands clutching tight to the broken pen parts he still held. “A marriage? That’s…archaic.” A moment later, his father’s implication caught up to him, and his eyes widened. “Hold on - are you saying you need a guaranteed heir? As in…?”

“You,” one of the council members confirmed. “Which is why we needed your input.”

“I can’t get  _ married _ !” Ed threw his hands into the air, accidentally flicking ink across the table, which he ignored. 

“Why not?” another council member asked. “Do you have a reasonable objection, beyond moral discomfort? Your country comes first.”

Ed stared at him for long, long moment, weighing his options. And, finally, he took the easiest and most ridiculous out he could.

“I don’t like women,” he told them.

“Irrelevant,” a council member said. “You don’t have to like your match.”

“I’d prefer you did,” Hohenheim said. “But, they are right. It’s not necessary. The two of you need only get along insofar as to make it clear we are not about to make any hostile moves.”

Ed couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “You honestly think I’m gonna-..?”

“ _ Yes _ ,” Hohenheim interrupted him. “I know you don’t want to, but the country must come first, Edward.”

Ed looked to his mother, who gave him a sad, soft smile. “Think about it?”

Ed let out a long breath, slumping in his seat. “Okay. I’ll… think about it.”

“That’s all we can ask,” Hohenheim said. 

That was a fucking  _ lie _ . They could, and would, ask much, much more.

They just didn’t have the time right then, was all. 

  
  
  
  
  
  


Despite knowing full well it was not a valid strategy, Edward did he very best to ignore the marriage thing until it just went away. 

Which, honestly, was probably why they didn’t ask for his input again. Meaning the next time he heard anything about it, it was Al waking him up and telling him they had to get ready to meet with an envoy from Xing. 

Instantly, Ed was on high alert, worried about what would be expected of him. He dressed himself in royal formal attire, rich red coat and all, and prayed that he was only there as the son of the king. He really,  _ really  _ didn’t want to think about being forced into a marriage. 

When he walked into the rarely-used throne room, his heart sunk, and he forced his expression to stay blank as he took his space beside his father.

There was a girl with them. 

She was around Alphonse’s age, maybe, but probably even younger, with her hair up in two buns and her wide eyes darting around the room with wonder.

Edward wasn’t really surprised the entire Xingese envoy seemed impressed with their palace. The architecture of Xerxes was leagues ahead of other nations - they were having their technological revolution while most countries were sorting out whether they wanted to be monarchies or democracies. The result was that all their buildings had a classical style to them, built long ago and made to last centuries, while still being advanced and modern. Alchemy had replaced candle-based light fixtures with electric ones, reinforced once-delicate ceramic with a steel skeleton, and most aesthetically impressive, created micro-etchings along every surface, sketching out elaborate patterns along banners and painting murals on the walls. 

Xersian architecture was considered one of the wonders of the world. Xing had medicine, Amestris had military force, and Xerxes had alchemy and the wonders they crafted with it. 

Her admiration of the building made Ed proud of his country, but that did not detract from the slow-growing fear that his father might still want him to consider a political marriage.

Edward didn’t like the idea, and he never would, but chances were his father didn’t actually care. 

His only hope was that the girl was there for a different purpose. She wasn’t the only young person in the group, after all - a boy closer to Ed’s age stood beside her, hair up in a long black ponytail and eyes eagerly soaking in the environment. While the girl had seemed awed to the point of intimidation, the boy’s look seemed more…hungry. Like he was desperate to gather as much information as possible.

Ominous.

“Ah, my sons have arrived,” Hohenheim’s voice carried to Ed’s ears upon their approach. “Emperor Duan Qing, meet my sons, Edward and Alphonse.”

The emperor was a tall, severe looking man, the skin on his face having a thin and papery look to it that gave Ed the impression his health was probably poor. His hollow cheeks and sunken eyes added to this effect, as did the disinterested stare he scanned over Ed with before looking to Al instead.

“I am pleased to be meeting you at last,” the emperor said, dipping into a low bow. “As a vital piece of our continued alliance, making your acquaintance was a high priority in our arrangements.”

Ed twitched, and stepped forward slightly, so that he was just a hair ahead of Al. His brother caught him by the elbow, grip shatteringly tight. 

“I’m glad to meet you, as well,” Al said, perfectly polite as always. “As I’m sure my elder brother is. Edward?”

Ed’s shoulders relaxed a fraction, as Al’s subtle redirect served to illustrate the point he’d about to make (loudly, and likely dramatically): that just because one brother was taller, didn’t mean he was the automatic elder.

“It’s nice,” he threw out, somewhat noncommittal, unused to direct interaction with dignitaries of any kind. His father’s constant paranoid rotation of councilmen and staff kept Ed from ever really having to worry about what sort of impression he made. He looked to his parents, raising his eyebrows in his mother’s direction, hoping she would offer some context for the meeting.

She didn’t have to. Ignoring Edward’s awkward dismissal entirely, the emperor turned and directed a sweeping gesture toward the two teens behind him. 

“I have brought with me the two of my forty-three heirs I thought best suited to this,” he said. “They are Ling of the clan Yao, and Mei of the clan Chang.” 

Fuck. Fuck, fuck,  _ fuck.  _ Vital piece of an alliance, and teens ‘best suited’ to the task. That was a confirmation, wasn’t it? 

They really hadn’t been kidding with the whole marriage thing, and Ed had run out of time to talk them out of it. 

Strange, though, that there were two of them. Was Mei’s brother brought to make her more comfortable? 

And what was with the ‘clan’ thing? Maybe the heirs weren’t actually the emperor’s kids? 

...Did he say  _ forty-three? _

“Edward,” Hohenheim called to him. “Perhaps you should guide the Xingese heirs to the guest wing?”

“Uh, okay,” Ed shifted, looking behind him, to where Al stood. “Al?”

Al looked to their father, who must have somehow signaled it was okay for him to tag along, because he let out a small received sigh and followed Ed out of the throne room. 

Quick steps behind them signaled the other teens following them, and Ed turned to face them once they were out in the hall.

“My asshole father probably won’t tell me, so I’ll ask you,” he said, looking to Mei. “Why are you guys here, exactly?”

She gave a wide-eyed blink. “...The Emperor and the King are planning an alliance, and we’re here to be part of the marriage contract.”

Ed’s stomach dropped. “Oh.”

“Oh, I know you’re probably not happy,” Mei said. “When they contacted us, they mentioned you had said you don’t like girls.”

Ed grimaced, because while that hadn’t been a lie, it had also not been the full truth. The  _ girl  _ part was not the bit that bothered him.

Mei wasn’t done, though. “I’m just the backup,” she said. “If you didn’t care either way, they’d put you with me, because that would be most convenient. Heirs, and all. But the first option was Ling.”

Ed blinked at her. “...What?”

The boy next to her stepped forward, giving him a bright smile and a low bow. “Hello,” he introduced. “I am Ling Yao, Prince of Xing, here on behest of my Emperor. And I am to be your husband.”

Ed was going to  _ scream. _


End file.
